There was a beautiful example of the power of turning words in a recent newspaper article about a local gang member who decided to “walk away from the whole thing” and agreed to testify against fellow members despite serious death threats the action incurred. Having known violence most of his young life of 28 years, this young man had little reason to cease his activities that operated at a sophisticated level whether in or out of prison. His choice likely saved many others as the gang’s activities had grown more and more lethal and widespread in recent years. He says his decision came when an inmate across from his cell who had spent 28 of his 42 years in prison said to him, “Unless you do something completely out of character, this is going to be your life.”
Although it’s likely many conditions and situations converged to create this moment, it just took these simple words for this young man to wake up to the cause and effect of his life and step out of a destructive pattern. This wake up moment didn’t require a lot of deliberation, weighing the pros and cons of action, evaluating the advice of self help books – it was decisive and calm – he didn’t plan his next activity, just called the jail deputy and the rest unfolded from there. That clarity of action is very different from impulsiveness, or fantasy of how wonderful things will be once we make a strategic change. This man’s life in many ways is now much more difficult, the price of living from the core of one’s being.
Although I have no way of knowing, I hear these words spoken in a calm quiet selfless way from this old wizened inmate resting his elbows on the cell grating. I imagine this inmate had seen dozens of young men come and go with the same illusion that they will beat the system. His words hold up a clear mirror to this person’s life, an aha! moment that arrests us in the moment. Like Buddhist practice, this kind offering comes from a fellow traveler, a friend who has made all that same mistakes and wishes you a better life. In turn, the older man expresses a kind of freedom despite his jail cell through his own bodhisattva action.
I was very grateful for this story and want to avoid romanticizing it. I cannot know what this young man’s life has been like, but wish him strength and courage in the coming time. All our lives contain subtle and not so subtle prisons from which the only freedom is something completely out of character. In many ways, to sit zazen and meet others on the path invites a calm clear mirror in which “this is your life” is inscribed. Lest this read too dismal, it’s important to know that our light as well as our shadow is equally reflected.
“Out of character” suggests another kind of move, another way of answering the koan, in which a new potential unfolds and the activity of wisdom, of instantly knowing what it is you need to do, guides your body, speech and mind. In practice, the more we move in this way, the more we trust the not-knowing and the risk, and life unfolds from the deepest place. It is not something that is planned out, but rather cultivated or invited. When we can find “out of character,” then our character, our maps of how to be in the world, ceases to be such a problem and serves the dharma. The old wizened cell mate offered his words from a place in which his own life experience served another, nothing wasted, nothing lost.
Palms together,
Seido
